Sharp has seemingly stuck to its word and finally plans to launch the 70-in 8K TV it hyped up back up in 2017 in Europe – priced at a cool €11,999 (and only a month later than scheduled).
There may be a few 8K TV’s floating around, but Sharp hopes to capitalise on the buzz surrounding the resolution by being one of the earliest to actually release one in Europe (…despite the lack of content actually available to watch), after successful launches in China and Japan.
The manufacturer hopes the LV-70X500E TV can compete with the likes of LG and Samsung with a processing engine for upconverting non-native content and HDR support (both HLG and HDR10). Regarding the former, Sharp’s keen to stress it’s not just a case of blowing up images but “enhancing” them – Samsung, of course, is working on somethings similar for its 8K “AI-powered” TV set for release later this year. Owners will also be able to view still images in 8K via USB if they fancy.
The one thing not present however is a TV tuner, with Sharp instead opting to give the 8K model 8 HDMI ports (four for 8K and the same number for standard 4K).
The TV incorporates an 8K LCD panel with an 7,680 x 4,320 resolution, as well as direct backlighting. Sharp states that it’s capable of 79% of the colour-gamut standard BT.2020.
Sharp’s LV-70X500E TV will be released at the close of April.